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Observations of An Ex-Cop in La La Land |
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 to be so gooda-lookin', you may some-a day marry a movie star!" |
How I started in business
in a Florida barber shop
By ANDY MURCIA
of TheColumnists.com
My son and I get our haircuts at “Archie’s of Hollywood” barber shop in the San Fernando Valley. While waiting my turn with Nick the barber the other day, I looked around the shop where time looks as if it got stuck in a tar pit.
On the walls there are photographs of old boxers like King Levinsky, Joe Louis, Tony Zale and Sugar Ray Robinson. The shelves are full of sports trophies from ball teams the shop has sponsored over the years. It’s a colorful place to visit and, at times, its customers are even more colorful.
I couldn’t help but compare the action in this barber shop with that of the one in the hit “Barber Shop” movies. The movie humor is anchored in the hip black jive talk of today while what goes on at Archie’s of Hollywood is more like what you found in the old-fashioned Italian barber shops of the 1950s, where I spent much of my youth.
This time Archie's was full of customers, as usual. All four barbers were clipping smartly. A Jerry Vale album, sung in Italian, was playing away. Andrew, my 12-year-old son, was first in Nick’s chair. I put my head back and closed my eyes to enjoy the music. The old Italian music took me on a trip back to my youth. It was the 1950’s in North Miami, Florida. I was 12 and we had just moved there from Brooklyn, N.Y.
I had my eye on a new bike then, but my bankroll was short, so I got a job. After school, I delivered prescriptions for Mr. Warren at the drug store on the corner, but business was slow. Most of the time I just sat around Warren’s Drug Store on Dixie Highway, waiting for a delivery job. Jack’s Barber Shop was a couple of doors away, so I walked in one day and asked Jack if he had a job for me. Jack worked the first chair and he asked me if I knew how to shine shoes. I said no. He said, “then hit the road kid, I only need a boot-black.”
Undaunted, I told him I could learn how to shine shoes. He sized me up and said, “okay. I’ll teach you. Come back in 20 minutes.”
Well, I went back and he showed me how to shine shoes. He said he’d buy the polish, furnish me with a stand in the back and I could keep all I made. He told me I had to sweep the hair up whenever I was there, and on Saturday nights I was to mop the floor. For this, he’d pay me $6. We shook hands, and I accepted the position.
Jack was not his real name–he was very Italian, had a mustache and always played a lot of Italian music in his shop by singers like Jimmy Roselli and Mario Lanza. Occasionally he put on a Frank Sinatra album. I brought him a record of a new singer who had a hit song out called “Because of You.” His name was Tony Bennett. But Jack didn't want to play him because, “He changed his name --and he's only for the kids.”
My business was good. I was making money. I also started to notice Jack would lean in and whisper something to certain customers in his chair as I was shining their kicks. He’d also write something down on the paper roll in the chair's headrest and then roll it up. I didn’t know what he was doing right off, but soon learned he was taking horse bets. My father was a retired NYPD Lieutenant, but had just taken the Chief of Police job in Surfside, Florida. North Miami, Florida was not his responsibility. I didn’t dare tell Pop about Jack booking bets because he'd have made me quit the job.
My Dad started coming into Jack’s for his haircuts. “Skinny” Jimmy in the second chair cut Pop’s hair and he’d always buy a shine from me. Pop was a big tipper. He’d give me a buck for a 25-cent shine. He would say, for everyone to hear, that it was the best shine he ever had. He’d wink at me.
One night at dinner my father told me he suspected Jack was a bookmaker. He asked me to quit working there. I begged Pop to let me keep the job until I got my money to buy the bike. Pop said he’d rather loan me the dough then be embarrassed should Jack get arrested. I promised to cut the grass and wash his car and Pop said, “Okay . It’s not my jurisdiction anyway, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
Friday afternoons and all day Saturday were our busiest times. I made most of my money in these two days and had the most fun. The conversations and laughter between the barbers and their customers about every thing from sports to women entertained me well. I learned a lot about life in general by working here, but mostly about sex and women.
Men say things in a barbershop they never would say anywhere else. Each barber had his own personality. Jack was the Boss--and was he ever loud when he’d sing along with his favorite Mario Lanza tunes! “Skinny” Jimmy was the “ladies man.” Whenever a Mom would bring her young boy in for a haircut, Jimmy always found a way to get next to her. After she left, he bragged about how he was going to have to give her something “one of these days.” Everyone would laugh.
“Tommy Taps” worked the third chair. He used to tap dance to work himself through barber school. Tony “Bah Boom” was in the fourth chair. He got his nickname from Jack because he farted so loud. My shine stand--unfortunately--was closest to Tony “Bah Boom's” chair. Each time he had an explosion in his drawers, I’d have to run for the door. I learned fast that Tony “Bah Boom” only blasted off when there were no customers in the shop. So, if customers were present, I was safe.
Something that always amused me occurred whenever I swept the hair piles from around each barber's chair. As I pushed the broom around their chairs I was amazed how the barber just knew where my broom was without taking his eye off the guy's hair. Their shiny shoed feet would precisely step over my broom as if choreographed in a slow, smooth, dance routine. Jack even had a way of using his elbow to block my view of the bets he wrote on the paper in the chair's headrest. While he trusted me somewhat, he really didn’t trust anyone completely.
Summers in south Florida are hot as hell, but I was kept very cool as Jack liked the air conditioner on all the time. I got to read a lot of adult type books there. If I ever read them at home, my father would have conked me on the noodle. I liked it at the shop, I felt like I had my own business. I used to dream that today it was shining shoes, but tomorrow who knew what I’d be selling?
One day I walked up to the door of the shop to go to work but it was locked. A note on the glass said; “Closed due to a death in the family.” I told Pop that Jack’s had closed and he said, “Yeah, I heard.”
He told me Jack had been shot and killed outside the Green Door Bar near Marcella’s Italian Restaurant late Saturday night. This was also located on my corner so I went to The Green Door Bar to have a look. I spotted a big wet spot on the light colored sidewalk towards the rear. I wondered if that was Jack’s blood. A dishwasher I knew came over and confirmed it for me. He said Jack had refused to pay a guy on a bet he booked. They had some words and the guy followed Jack outside and shot him twice. I remember just staring at the wet spot there for what seemed like a long time.
I often would think about Jack and how he gave me my first start in business. I even started to miss hearing his loud voice singing Italian songs that were way out of his range.
Jack's wife closed the shop for good. It was kind of sad. She dropped off a big box at my house, filled with all the polishes, brushes, and snap rags. She had a note in the box that said , “Hi, Andy. Jack liked you and said you were a good worker. Here’s some money to tide you over.” There was a $20 bill taped to the note.
Suddenly, my memories of all this were rudely interrupted. I guess I'd been having a solid nap at Archie's barber shop while Andrew was in the chair. Now somebody was shaking me.
"Hey, Andy, wake up.
You’re next!"
It was Nick and Andrew talking to me. I woke up fast. On the
way to take my seat in Nick's chair, I looked in the mirror.
Man, was I shocked to see how bad I looked for a 12-year-old
kid! As they say, you can't go home again--not even in dreams.
©2004 by Andy Murcia.
The caricature of Andy Murcia is ©2003 by Jim Hummel. The
cartoon is from IMSI's Master Clips Collection, 1895 Francisco
Blvd. E., San Rafael, CA, 94901-5506, USA.
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